Banana farming in Kenya: Options for rejuvenating productivity

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Bananas constitute an important component of farm enterprises
in the mid altitudes of central and eastern provinces of Kenya.
In recent years the crop has steadily gained importance over
traditional cash crops, e.g. coffee, and various short season
horticultural crops grown mostly for export markets. Despite
its increasing importance, the crop’s production faces intractable
constraints. Interventions have previously focused on increasing
availability of healthy seedlings and strengthening farmer
capacity to manage pests. Recent indications are that there is
need to re-think current approaches to enhancing productivity.
Interventions should consider creating micro-financing and value
addition opportunities, and extending technologies to cope with
climate change effects.

"The 2010 RUFORUM Biennial Conference was the second in the series. The main objective of the Biennial conferences is to provide a platform for agricultural research for development stakeholders in Africa and beyond to actively exchange findings and experiences, while at the same time learning lessons towards improving performance of the agricultural sector and ultimately people’s livelihoods. The biennial conference is RUFORUM’s most comprehensive meeting for the diversity of stakeholers in agriculture. It is especially dedicated to graduate students and their supervisors, grantees in RUFORUM member universities and alumni. It is a platform for peer review, quality control, mentorship, networking and shared learning. This record contains an extended abstract accepted under the theme agronomy".